Chapter 3 #2
We spend the next ten minutes riding in silence, heads turned in opposite directions as we watch the outside world pass by through our respective windows—bright city lights, tree-lined avenues, pedestrians pausing to watch the car slide by.
I fully admit the evening hasn’t got off to the best of starts, and most of that is my fault.
I was far too keen to suspect the worst earlier resulting in an awkward introduction to one another, and then I ought to have just asked him to belt up instead of attempting to do the job for him.
Now he’s pissed off over my presence, and I just know he’s going to take every opportunity to be obnoxious and uncooperative.
I really ought to make the effort to defuse things, and attempt to win his trust. If I’m going to keep him safe, we need to forge a relationship that’s based on something other than ire.
The sticking point is how to do that. How do I build a professional relationship with a man I’m desperately attempting to suppress lewd thoughts about?
I turn my head and note the vast acreage of leather seat between us.
Building a bridge across that chasm seems an architectural impossibility.
I cough to clear my throat. “Is there anything about your plans for the night I should be aware of in advance?”
“Yeah,” he drawls in reply, his delivery entirely serious. “If I disappear off to some secluded spot, it’s probably because I’m screwing, and I don’t require an audience.”
“You’re planning to have sex at the event?”
The grin that peels his lips back over his teeth and turns into a rumbling laugh just about slays me.
“I’m not planning anything. I endeavour to go with the flow. Where that leads, who knows? What I said was that if shagging occurs, I’d prefer it if you didn’t ruin the moment with your presence.”
“I don’t see that I ruined anything for you earlier.” The words are out before I’ve engaged the brain, and worked out that a simple Request noted, would have sufficed. “You still came. You didn’t shrivel…”
Somehow our gazes lock, and something raw zaps between us, something that feels very much like sexual tension, but which is likely only felt on my part.
I’m uncomfortably hot, despite the chill of the air-con that Johns has ramped up.
I don’t know what I’m doing here. I ought to have spelled it out to Howard that this is a bad idea, but I just couldn’t deprive myself of the pleasure, or risk the rebuke.
Dylan Drake in the flesh is worth ten of the celluloid variety.
He’s pretty in the way even the most rugged of actors seem to be these days.
Dark hair falls over his face when he tilts his head, escaping the bounds of whatever styling product he worked through the strands earlier.
His eyes are twin shards of cobalt blue.
They glitter when the light hits them, revealing inner warmth.
Not that he’s displaying a whole lot of warmth to me.
“Will my lock be fixed by the time we return? You have to admit, it makes for awful easy access otherwise. Any old nutter could walk in.”
“There’s a team already on it.”
“Hm.” He sniffs, giving the distinct impression that wasn’t necessarily the answer he wanted to hear, even though surely it’s the outcome he wants.
“Your safety is our priority, Dylan.”
His gaze snaps tight to mine again when I say his name. “Of course, and I’m utterly appreciative of that fact.”
Sarky bugger doesn’t mean a damn word of it.
No matter, if we both have to pretend to get through this, then that’s what we’ll do.
I’ll pretend I’m a professional, and not a crazy woman who’d dearly like to strip him naked and work on convincing him to turncoat, and he can pretend he doesn’t mind being babysat like he’s a teenage tearaway.
That’s when I notice how he’s sitting, legs splayed, not because he’s manspreading and trying to occupy more space, but because he still has a raging hard on.
He came.
I watched it happen.
So why’s he still turned on now?
Did the sight of Adam Bask really do it for him? I know they’ve worked together before.
It was just a glimpse through a window. Surely he’s not that infatuated.
That can’t be the reason. I totally credit him with more sense and taste.
Bask would just use him. Any pleasure Dylan derived from such an arrangement wouldn’t be worth it in the long term.
He has to know that. Surely he sees that.
His gaze focusses on my legs and the diamante fringe of my cocktail dress.
Whatever humour was previously present in his expression has now drained away.
It’s like looking at a different man. A tired, world-worn man composed of granite lines and icy ridges.
He’s still beautiful, but in a less airbrushed way.
He looks real and grizzly. There should be a five o’clock shadow covering his jaw, and hint of sweat about him.
It’s probably a batty move, but I stretch out my hand and cover his where it rests against the seat, though he snatches his away before I manage to complete the reassuring squeeze I was attempting to offer. “Don’t worry, I’ll endeavour to make this as painless as possible.”
His laugh is entirely humourless.
Two blocks from the venue, the crowd thickens. The public are penned in behind crash barriers, but stragglers meander across the roads and I spot more than a few lunatics clinging to shop-front signage, and precariously perched amongst tree branches.
My hackles rise as Johns is forced to slow the car to a virtual crawl.
“We’re sitting ducks here. We need to find an alternate route into the venue.” I lean forward to communicate with Johns, and take a look at the sat nav.
“There’s a way around the back,” he says. “Staff entrance. Howard and I discussed it.”
Dylan shifts forward in his seat too. “This is a red carpet event people. Crawling’s to be expected.
It’s a procession. The whole point is to be seen.
What did you think we’d be arriving to? People come out to check out the eye-candy.
That’s why we dress up in all this clobber.
Happy punters make for bigger box-office returns. ”
I never imagined him to be so clued up or cynical about the business he’s in.
“Dylan, this might be normal, but it’s a security nightmare. It’s going to be a lot safer if we arrive incognito.”
“I’m not going in the back door.”
“Not a phrase that comes out of your mouth all that often I expect,” Johns quips.
I expect Dylan to just take the remark in his stride, I’m sure he’s been the butt of far worse puns. Also, my track record of doing and saying the wrong thing tonight is hardly stellar.
“Think the fact I’m gay’s a fucking joke, do you?” His eyes narrow to slits.
“What? No,” Johns protests. “It was just a joke.”
“Think I’m a stupid joke, do you?” His jaw hardens, and his shoulders seem to grow in breadth.
His expression is instantly transformed into the one millions of viewers both home and abroad have been utterly mesmerised by.
He glowers over the headrest at Johns like he’s contemplating producing a razor wire and throttling him on the spot for that slight.
“Neither of us have a problem with your orientation, Dylan.”
More lies. It’s likely Johns doesn’t have a problem, but I have a major one.
I mean, what sort of selfish prick is he to be all guy exclusive and deprive the women of the world—and very specifically me—of his roasting hot bod, instead sanctioning us to forever do our drooling over him from a distance.
Has he no concept of how many dreams he’s smashed?
How many hearts he’s broken? How he broke mine?
“Dylan, we’re here to protect you, but you don’t seem to have grasped the severity of the danger.”
“That’s because it’s a joke. It’s a setup. Some scribbled note threatening to fuck me up gets delivered to me with a poached egg and suddenly I require a 24/7 armed guard. I’ve been in greater danger most of my life and nobody raised a fucking finger to help.”
He’s angry now, genuinely so, and I don’t know where this fury has come from. Not as a result of one ill-thought remark, or because a couple of studio bigwigs are trying to curtail his freedom. It’s deeper rooted than that.
“I am so done with this bollocks. I’m not going to pretend there’s a psycho on the loose intent on doing me injury. It’s just not happening.”
Before either Johns or I have a chance to react, Dylan throws open the rear passenger side door and exits the vehicle. We’re barely crawling, so it’s a smooth exit. He’s probably done it before for the movie cameras.
“Shit!” I’m not nearly so graceful, hampered by too high heels, and a skirt. Whose bright fucking idea was it to dress me like an overpriced whore?
Dylan’s already level with the nearest crash barrier by the time I’ve released my seatbelt.
I’ve no choice but to go after him. The shocker is that I’m actually grateful to the crowd, because they slow him down and allow me to reach his side.
I link arms with him as if we’re genuine dates for the evening. “Get back in the car.”
“Fuck off.”
He shakes me off and leans over the barrier to give a fan a kiss. Those around them tug at his clothing, so that he’s very nearly dragged into the crowd. I have to tug him back to earth.
“What the hell are you playing at? Whoever it is that’s threatening you could be in this crowd.”
“Then do your job and keep me safe.”
He might not realise it, but that’s already what I’m trying to do.
We’re way too exposed. There are people on all sides, and as he won’t go back to the car, the only option is to push on towards the venue.
Even once we reach the red carpet, I remain on alert.
The ushers opening car doors for the celebrity arrivals, pause to allow Dylan his moment in the spotlight, before helping the next starlet have her turn.